1. Doctor finds anecdotal evidence that people are passing kidney stones after riding on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad at Disney World
2. Doctor makes 3-D model of kidney, complete with stones and urine (his own), takes it on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad 60 times
3. “The stones passed 63.89 percent of the time while the kidneys were in the back of the car. When they were in the front, the passage rate was only 16.67 percent. That’s based on only 60 rides on a single coaster, and Wartinger guards his excitement in the journal article: ‘Preliminary study findings support the anecdotal evidence that a ride on a moderate-intensity roller coaster could benefit some patients with small kidney stones.’”
4. “Some rides are going to be more advantageous for some patients than other rides. So I wouldn’t say that the only ride that helps you pass stones is Big Thunder Mountain. That’s grossly inaccurate.”
5. “His advice for now: If you know you have a stone that’s smaller than five millimeters, riding a series of roller coasters could help you pass that stone before it gets to an obstructive size and either causes debilitating colic or requires a $10,000 procedure to try and break it up. And even once a stone is broken up using shock waves, tiny fragments and “dust” remain that need to be passed. The coaster could help with that, too.”
SCIENCE: IT WORKS
Update:
“In all, we used 174 kidney stones of varying shapes, sizes and weights to see if each model worked on the same ride and on two other roller coasters,” Wartinger said. “Big Thunder Mountain was the only one that worked. We tried Space Mountain and Aerosmith’s Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster and both failed.”Wartinger went on to explain that these other rides are too fast and too violent with a G-force that pins the stone into the kidney and doesn’t allow it to pass.“The ideal coaster is rough and quick with some twists and turns, but no upside down or inverted movements,” he said.
I just love this because it’s HILARIOUS and yet also a perfect archetypal example of The Scientific Method:
1. Hypothesis
2. Experiment
3. Results
4. Discussion
5. Conclusions
6. GOTO 1 (the scientific method is iterative, don’t forget that part)
was this like… done in cooperation with disney management or did some random scientist go through bag check with a 3d printed kidney and a bottle of piss and start looking for big thunder mountain fastpasses
Of course, the researchers had to get permission from Disney World before bringing the model kidney onto the rides. “It was a little bit of luck,” Wartinger recalls. “We went to guest services, and we didn’t want them to wonder what was going on—two adult men riding the same ride again and again, carrying a backpack. We told them what our intent was, and it turned out that the manager that day was a guy who recently had a kidney stone. He called the ride manager and said, do whatever you can to help these guys, they’re trying to help people with kidney stones.”
This evolutionary experiment has been going on for thousands of years.
And the efforts of small-scale farmers, a recent study suggests,
generate the bulk of corn’s genetic diversity in North America. In the
face of more aggressive weather threats researchers say the finding
comes at a critical time. “This takes things a step further,” says
Daniel Piñero, a plant population geneticist at the National Autonomous
University of Mexico. “Family farmers are not only preserving the
[genetic] diversity of maize,” or corn, Piñero says—they are
contributing more of it.
In the study Mauricio Bellon, a social scientist who works for Mexico’s
National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity, and his
colleagues used government numbers from the 2010 rainy season—the last
year a national census was done. The team narrowed in on the
municipalities with maize yields of up to three metric tons per
hectare—in other words, where people still grow their own food and
cultivate native varieties. The researchers then estimated the area
where corn hybrids are produced at a commercial scale…
The weirdest thing by far about the “Why didn’t they just ask a
[person who experiences that type of marginalization/trauma/adverse
situation]” response is that, well, they did. That’s literally
what they’re doing when they conduct research on that topic. Sure,
research is a more formal and systematic way of asking people about
their experiences, but it’s still a way.
And while researchers do tend to have all kinds of privilege relative
to the people who participate in their studies, many researchers are
also pushed to study certain kinds of oppression and marginalization
because they’ve experienced it themselves. While I never did end up
applying to a doctoral program, I did have a whole list of topics I
wanted to study if I ever got there and many of them were informed
directly by my own life. The reason researchers study “obvious”
questions like “does fat-shaming hurt people” isn’t necessarily because
they truly don’t know, but because 1) their personal anecdotal opinion
isn’t exactly going to sway the scientific establishment and 2)
establishing these basic facts in research allows them to build a
foundation for future work and receive grant funding for that work. In
my experience, researchers often strongly suspect that their hypothesis
is true before they even begin conducting the study; if they didn’t,
they might not even conduct it.
That’s why studies that investigate “obvious” social science
questions are a good sign, not a bad one. They’re not a sign that
clueless researchers have no idea about these basic things and can’t be
bothered to ask a Real Marginalized Person; they’re a sign that
researchers strongly suspect that these effects are happening but want
to be able to make an even stronger case by including as many Real
Marginalized People in the study as financially/logistically possible.
See also: “well of course [traditional medicine thing] works, why didn’t you listen to people who said it does?”
Well, for starters, the placebo effect is a real thing, and also where do you think the idea came from in the first place?
People don’t do studies because they have no idea what’s going to happen. They do studies because they think they know how something works and they want to confirm that.
And then on top of it, we conduct “obvious” research because sometimes what everyone knows is still wrong.
Fifty years ago everyone knew, and would swear to you by their personal experience, that paddling kids with a wooden spoon never did them any harm and, in fact, was absolutely necessary if you wanted to raise kids that had any respect for authority.
Right now there are hundreds of people out there training horses who know, from their extensive personal experience, that aversive (aka punishment-style) discipline is absolutely central to horsemanship. Of course, repeated actual studies show they’re wrong. But they still know it from their own experience.
We KNEW that dieting worked! As a society, we KNEW it was calories in calories out, one to one ratio, dead simple, you could see it all the time why would you need to test it? Except it turned out that when we did, it turned out to be a WHOLE LOT MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT.
Out there right now are all kinds of cops who know, from their own experience, that aggressive, tough-on-crime, jail-sentences-for-all methods are the only ones that work. They know it. This is their whole lives, they’ve lived it! … They also appear to be dead wrong, by the data.
We KNEW, at one point, that cigarettes were GOOD for asthma. They cleared the tubes! We KNEW that the human uterine lining is meant to make a warm, nurturing nest for the fertilized ovum to settle into! We knew all kinds of damn things.
For that matter, it’s common-sense obvious to any kid on the playground that things that are heavier will fall faster than things that are lighter. We knew that once too. And everyone with the slightest common sense (many people say) can TELL that the world is more violent and dangerous now than it was in the 1950s.
Except it turns out absolutely none of this is true. We were wrong. In all of those cases the common sense, obvious, “anyone who has any experience with these things knows that” answers were absolutely wrong. But we didn’t find that out until we did the work.
So yes a lot – a LOT – of the time these things really totally are “I’m pretty damn sure what the outcome is, so I’m going to study it for those reasons.” But we also do this work so that when we turn out to be wrong, we find out.
(My field works a lot with child-development stuff. The current big mess is “screen-time”. Everyone – including such bodies as the American Association of Pediatricians, and so on – KNOWS that screen-time for kids under a certain age is bad for them!
So it’s becoming increasingly awkward when the well-controlled, rigorous studies keep showing that this is not the case. Same happened with TV. Always look.)
Fun story about that:
In 1909 Robert Millikan and Harvey Fletcher measured the charge on the electron in what’s know as “the Millikan oil drop experiment” (sorry, Harvey). They got it wrong. As Feynman told it:
It’s a little bit off because he had the incorrect value for the viscosity of air. It’s interesting to look at the history of measurements of the charge of an electron, after Millikan. If you plot them as a function of time, you find that one is a little bit bigger than Millikan’s, and the next one’s a little bit bigger than that, and the next one’s a little bit bigger than that, until finally they settle down to a number which is higher.
Why didn’t they discover the new number was higher right away? It’s a thing that scientists are ashamed of—this history—because it’s apparent that people did things like this: When they got a number that was too high above Millikan’s, they thought something must be wrong—and they would look for and find a reason why something might be wrong. When they got a number close to Millikan’s value they didn’t look so hard.
Good studies of things we “already know” are important, because sometimes what we already know is wrong.
Fish with no scales, thin gelatinous skin, and a bulbous head? That’s the deep sea for you!
Snailfish (Family Liparidae) have long, tadpole-like bodies with large
heads and small eyes. They live throughout the world’s oceans from the
Arctic to the Antarctic and from the shallow intertidal zone to many
thousands of meters in the deep sea. They eat small benthic crustaceans,
molluscs, polychaete worms, and other small invertebrates.
This
snailfish, Careproctus longifilis, was photographed using ROV Tiburon
3,300 meters (>10,800 feet) deep in the Monterey Canyon. ⠀
Referred Species: A. valisineria (Canvasback, Extant), A. ferina (Common Pochard, Extant), A. americana (Redhead, Extant), A. collaris (Ring-Necked Ducks, Extant), A. australis (Hardhead, Extant), A. baeri (Baer’s Pochard, Extant), A. nyroca (Ferruginous Duck, Extant), A. innotata (Madagascar Pochard, Extant), A. novaeseelandiae (New Zealand Scaup, Extant), A. fuligula (Tufted Duck, Extant), A. marila (Greater Scaup, Extant), A. affinis (Lesser Scaup, Extant), A. shihuibas (Extinct), A. denesi (Extinct)
Ferruginous Duck by Francis C. Franklin, CC BY-SA 3.0
Aythya is a large genus of diving ducks from all over the world, including many different species including Scaups and Pochard. While most species in this genus are not threatened with extinction, a few of them are critically endangered, especially those in insular environments. The oldest occurrence of this genus is from the late Miocene, and as such it appears to be about 12 million years old, from the Tortonian age of the Miocene of the Neogene, until today. Almost all of these ducks are associated with marine environments, given their diving ecology.
A. shihuibas is one of two known extinct species in this genus, from the Late Miocene of China. A. denesi is another species, hailing from the late Miocene of Hungary, specifically the Polgárdi 4 formation in Feér County. There is also an Early Pleistocene member of this genus from Turkey that remains undescribed. These extinct members of the genus are, in general, known from fairly limited material. A. denesi is known from fairly limited material of the humerus, showing it was very similar to living members of this genus of diving ducks, showing advanced structures typical of this genus, but still retaining some of the more plesiomorphic (re: ancestral) features of ducks in general, including some fairly “primitive” characteristics. This shows that these diving ducks were still transitional in their evolution in the late Miocene, and it was only recently that modern forms for this genus were really starting to appear.
Canvasback by Dick Daniels, CC BY-SA 3.0
The Canvasback, A. valisineria, is an unthreatened species of this genus primarily from North America. It breeds in Canada and the Western United States, and spends the winters in most of the rest of the United States and Mexico. The largest species of this genus, it is about the size of a mallard, weighing up to 1.6 kilograms, though it is more compact than the mallard. The males have ruddy brown heads with black necks and white bodies, while the females are more brown all over. They nest primarily on water near prairie marshes, though some breed in subarctic river deltas. They lay about 5 to 11 eggs at a time. They feed primarily on seeds, buds, leaves, tubers, roots, snails, and insects, mainly by diving but also by dabbling, given their wide variety of habitats – they are highly migratory ducks!
Common Pochard by Tony Hisgett, CC BY 2.0
The Common Pochard, A. ferina, is a species vulnerable to extinction from Europe and Asia. They are migratory birds as well, spending winter in Southwestern Europe, and are commonly found breeding in the northern British Isles. The males have distinctive red heads, black necks, and white bodies, while the females are primarily brown and actually make growling sounds. They form very large flocks, often mixed ones, and feed by both diving and dabbling on aquatic plants, molluscs, insects, and even fish. They usually feed during the night. Due to urbanization and overhunting, their populations are currently on decline.
Redhead Duck by Kevin Bercaw, CC BY 3.0
The Redhead Duck, A. americana, is a nonthreatened species from North America, with males once again very distinct due to the bright red heads and greyish-black bodies. They spend the winter in Southern North America, and then breed in the Western United States and Canada, migrating between these two locations. They are very well adapted for underwater foraging, with legs far back on their bodies to aid in diving, but making land walking extremely difficult. They feed primarily on gastropods, molluscs, and insects, and will eat plants during the winter as well. They prefer living in wetland environments, especially ones with deep enough water for vegetation for their breeding habitat. They do flock together on lakes and migrate in pairs, with elaborate courtship rituals involving the males kinking their necks and stretching them for display, making calls until the female shows reciprocation. They build nests in thick plant material, and actually breed in very social environments, laying eggs of up to 7 young.
Ring-Necked Duck by Dan Pancamo, CC BY-SA 2.0
The Ring-Necked Duck, A. collaris, is another diving duck of least concern from North America, breeding in Canada and then migrating down to the Southwestern United States and Mexico for the winter season. Dark in color, the males have noticeable white beaks and bright white wings, with red rings around their necks, while the females are more dark in color all around (as shown above). They breed in wooded lakes and ponds, mainly in boreal regions, and then migrate to lakes, ponds, rivers, and bays in warmer climates. Though they form pairs for breeding, they usually separate after reproduction. About 10 eggs are laid per clutch, which are guarded by the mothers until the young can fly. They are omnivores, feeding on animals and plants throughout the year, though they prefer plants to animals as adults.
Hardhead, by Fir0002, GFDL 1.2
The Hardhead, A. australis, is the only diving duck known from Australia, not considered threatened with extinction due to its widespread presence in its range. They are common in the south-eastern portion of Australia, but also is found frequently near coasts. They are fairly nomadic ducks, except during drought years, when they disperse in search of water. They dive deeply for food, and are often found submerged fro even a minute at a time, eating a lot of small water animals. They enjoy living in lakes, swamps, and rivers, but are usually avoiding the coast, and are rarely found on land. They are actually fairly small ducks, and both males and females are brown, though the males have darker brown heads.
Baer’s Pochard by Dick Daniels, CC BY-SA 3.0
Baer’s Pochard, A. baeri, is a critically endangered diving duck from eastern Asia, breeding in Russia and China and migrating to Vietnam, Japan, and India for the winter months. It is a fairly small duck with long, distinctive beaks, and dark heads with brown bodies in the males. They are fairly similar in general to other members of this genus, breeding around lakes with rich vegetation and nesting in dense grass, typically favoring coastal wetlands and ponds. Unfortunately, its numbers are decreasing very rapidly, primarily due to wetland destruction and hunting, with up to 3,000 individuals killed every year.
Ferruginous Ducks by Erbanor, in the Public Domain
The Ferruginous Duck, A. nyroca, is a near-threatened species from Eurasia, with males and females being a chestnut brown, though the females slightly darker and duller than the males. They live in shallow bodies of fresh water, sometimes slightly salty ones. They breed from the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghreb south to Arabia, and then winters in the Mediterranean Basin and Black Sea. They are fairly social, and lay eggs in sites next to water. They both dive and dabble for food, feeding primarily on aquatic plants and insects. They are threatened due to habitat degradation by humans, mainly due to impoundment, drainage, and pollution. Non-native species also cause invasive competition for these birds.
Madagascan Pochard by Frank Vassen, CC BY 2.0
The Madagascan Pochard, A. innotata, is a very critically endangered and rare species of diving duck, primarily known from Lake Matsaborimena in Madagascar. The population today is only around 80 individuals. They probably started an extreme decline in the mid-1900s, due to introduction of fish species that would kill pochard chicks. Rice cultivation has also lead to sharp population declines. The last sighting prior to recent times was a small flock in 1960; after that point, only a few more have been seen, though rescue plans are ongoing and captive breeding is working, with reintroduction on Lake Sofia planned for the near future.
New Zealand Scaup by Tony Wills, CC BY-SA 3.0
The New Zealand Scaup, A. novaeseelandiae, is a nonthreatened species found throughout New Zealand and no one else. It is commonly called the Papango by the Māori. The Papango is a diving duck that can submerge for up to half a minute, looking for aquatic plants and small animals. They are found in deep freshwater lakes and ponds, and it doesn’t migrate. They lay eggs from October to March, up to eight in a clutch, which are incubated by the females and brought to suitable diving locations soon after hatching. Males have striking yellow eyes and greenish heads, while the females have a white patch on their faces and non-yellow eyes.
Tufted Duck by Andreas Trepte, CC BY-SA 2.5
The Tufted Duck, A. fuligula, is a small, nonthreatened diving duck, with up to one million birds out in the wild. It is found across all of the Northern Hemisphere, found as a winter visitor in the United States and Canada, though primarily known from Europe and certain localities in Asia such as the Indian subcontinent and Japan. They breed close to marshes and lakes with vegetation to conceal their nests, and they are also often found on coastal lagoons and ponds. They dive for food, feeding primarily on molluscs and insects. The males are all black except for white sides of their bodies, with clear little crests coming off of their heads; while the females are more brownish.
Greater Scaup by Calibas, CC BY-SA 4.0
The Greater Scaup, A. marila, is a commonly known diving duck from the Northern Hemisphere. This duck is so commonly known that decoys for hunting are often designed off of it, and their distinctive patterns are see frequently in duck-related things (my mom had bookends that looked like Greater Scaups). The males have dark green and black heads and striped backs, with distinct white and black patterns on their bodies. The females are mostly brown, but also have white patches on their sides. These ducks live in both North America and Eurasia, typically near coastal areas and around lakes. They eat aquatic molluscs, plants, and insects, which they get through diving. They weigh up to 1.4 kilograms, and are primarily associated with polar regions as well. They breed in the tundra and boreal forests, nesting on islands in northern lakes. The males make quick soft whistles to attract the females, which make raspy vocalizations in response. They form monogamous pairs, which nest close together, and after the eggs are laid the males leave the females. The females lay up to nine eggs, and the chicks are able to walk nearly immediately, though the female guards them until they’re able to fend for themselves. They are threatened by a variety of predators, including humans; they are also threatened by pollution; but there are conservation efforts ongoing, including banding programs.
Lesser Scaup by Connor Mah, CC BY-SA 3.0
And finally, the Lesser Scaup, A. affinis, is a smaller American species that is also not threatened with extinction. It breeds primarily in Canada, migrates across the Northern United States, and winters in the Southern United States, Mexico, and Central America. These ducks weigh up to 1 kilogram, and the males have black heads and striped bodies, while the females are primarily brown. Quieter ducks, they are frequently hard to distinguish from the Greater Scaup, especially since they often flock together. However, Lesser Scaups have darker irises than Greater Scaups. These ducks breed primarily in inland lakes and marsh ponds, and then migrate south. They forage through mud at the bottom of these waterways, and even will dabble rather than dive, though they primarily dive for molluscs and some aquatic plants. They nest in sheltered locations near the water, in shallow depressions lined with plants and down feathers, and lay up to 11 eggs in a nest, which are watched primarily by the mothers. Though not threatened yet, they are experiencing sharp declines in population, primarily due to decreasing breeding success, pollution, and habitat destruction, as well as climate change.
When an individual crab finds a new empty shell it will leave its own shell and inspect the vacant shell for size. If the shell is found to be too large, the crab goes back to its own shell and then waits by the vacant shell for anything up to 8 hours. As new crabs arrive they also inspect the shell and, if it is too big, wait with the others, forming a group of up to 20 individuals, holding onto each other in a line from the largest to the smallest crab. As soon as a crab arrives that is the right size for the vacant shell and claims it, leaving its old shell vacant, then all the crabs in the queue swiftly exchange shells in sequence, each one moving up to the next size.
Here is footage from the BBC of this happening: [x]
Muskoxen,
Bering Land Bridge National Park, Alaska
With thick, long fur that trails like a skirt, muskoxen make motherhood look easy. Called Oomingmak
in the Inupiaq Eskimo language, meaning “hairy one” or “bearded one,”
muskoxen live in complex social circles with up to 75 in a herd, which
can be seen frolicking through the Alaskan tundra.
The ocean will
seemingly never run out of strange creatures to baffle the mind —
especially when you factor in the extinct ones from millions of years
ago.
You think the hammerhead shark or the barreleye fish are weirdly built, right? But, then you hear about animals like the ancient Dunkleosteus or the giant sea scorpion,
and you’re probably like, “Wow I am so glad I didn’t live in a time
where 8-foot swimming scorpions and fish with blades for teeth existed.”
Millions of years ago, the sea was kind of a free-for-all in terms of what nightmare animals lived there. Take, for instance, the Stethacanthus, a shark with spikes on its head and dorsal fin.
And it’s the weirdest-looking dorsal fin you’ll ever see…
Urocyon's Jaunts 2.0 
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